Confused why characters are deleted.

[Vinnie66]

I really have no idea why Square Enix makes it so hard to return to previous played characters (aside from characters the player themself deleted, that is understandable). I could go back to my everquest 1 characters which i stopped playing nearly 5 years ago and they are still there waiting (if i wanted to .. which i don't) Really is it that hard to store a couple mb' of file/character info? I mean it cant be that much information "drive space wise". So what's the deal with deleting our stuff? I was going to return and I would really like to as World of Warcraft is just a huge bore now and I had only played up to chains of promethia. 2 more expansions for me to explore, but i really have no urge to start from the beginning... esspecialy when I had a character with Bard and Whitemage both at 75.

So my story this afternoon,

I sat on hold with the support chat for nearly 4 hours today to see if I could get my old character restored. I never *deleted* him in anyway. All I did was cancel the content ID. So after 4 hours of being on hold I get a 2 line answer from a CSR saying quote "I don't think you can, thanks for contacting Playonline, have a nice day *click*"

So after being grumpy at that I called my friend, who i was planning on returning with, and also sat on hold with the chat for nearly the same length of time.. but he had his restored completley and 100% like he had left it, and his account was cancelled LONG LONG LONG before mine ever was.

Is it worth for me to even try again? Or can I just expect the 2 line answer again? I don't understand why his was restorable and mine wasn't. Do they just randomly pick who's characters will be deleted?? I have even read in a few threads here of characters 2+ years old being restored... so why do I feel like I'm being picked on

[TheGrandMom]

Re: Confused why characters are deleted.

Web Chat Support: https://secure.playonline.com/supportus/index.html

Try that. At least if you have to wait hours for an answer, you can watch videos or play a game while you do. LOL I hate having a phone held up to my ear for hours on end. I would have hung up loooooong before waiting as long as you did! LOL

Also, make sure you have all the relavant information pertaining to your account. You'll need your POL ID, password, credit card info, etc. It might even help to have your registration codes that were in your game manual. And this time, ask why if they say no. Get a solid answer from them since there has to be a reason. Good luck to you!

[Vinnie66]

Re: Confused why characters are deleted.

I wasn't on hold on the phone. I was on hold on the live chat that you linked. Sorry I guess I worded it poorly. I did give all my information. Name. Address. First and Last 4 of CC.. my POL ID. His answer was so quick though, its like he didn't even investigate.

I will admit it has been nearly 1.5 yrs since I last played, but as i said my friend who cancelled probably 6-8 months before me got his reinstated. Wouldn't they keep them some where on a flash drive or something? This is what confuses me.. the character files are just a bunch of binaries.. it's not like they are massive memory hog files. What's so hard about storing them?

I guess I will try once more. I hope it all works out.. there are no other games out there to keep me occupied.. god forbid I go back to WoW just to have a time killer

[Kailea]

Re: Confused why characters are deleted.

I wasn't on hold on the phone. I was on hold on the live chat that you linked. Sorry I guess I worded it poorly. I did give all my information. Name. Address. First and Last 4 of CC.. my POL ID. His answer was so quick though, its like he didn't even investigate.

I will admit it has been nearly 1.5 yrs since I last played, but as i said my friend who cancelled probably 6-8 months before me got his reinstated. Wouldn't they keep them some where on a flash drive or something? This is what confuses me.. the character files are just a bunch of binaries.. it's not like they are massive memory hog files. What's so hard about storing them?

I guess I will try once more. I hope it all works out.. there are no other games out there to keep me occupied.. god forbid I go back to WoW just to have a time killer

its more like a gamble really, but that person on the chat sounded like they did not even try. I would call the phone support and have all your info ready.

[Flanteus]

Re: Confused why characters are deleted.

are you sure your character is deleted? or you only assuming?

I also quited for a year and couple months came back and my character was there exactly where I left it..somewhere lost in the wild lol...
check you account it might not be deleted as you think..thats if you are assuming..if not, I hope you get your character back just keep calling them and ask your friend who retrieve his character.. so you can talk to that supportive guy! shocking i know..

[Feba]

Re: Confused why characters are deleted.

FFXI characters have a lot of information linked to them, that most people might not realize. For example, how far you are in a specific quest, or hidden stats (like the number of kills on the DRK quest sword). When you're talking about storing thousands of them, yes, it could add up to quite a bit of space. There's also the obvious "don't quit" incentive.

[Vinnie66]

Re: Confused why characters are deleted.

FFXI characters have a lot of information linked to them, that most people might not realize. For example, how far you are in a specific quest, or hidden stats (like the number of kills on the DRK quest sword). When you're talking about storing thousands of them, yes, it could add up to quite a bit of space. There's also the obvious "don't quit" incentive.

It's still just a binary file ... even at a few megs a person.. you can buy terabyte drives for quite cheap now. Am going to try again though today hehe. Wish me luck !

[Omni]

Re: Confused why characters are deleted.

It's still just a binary file ... even at a few megs a person.. you can buy terabyte drives for quite cheap now. Am going to try again though today hehe. Wish me luck !

its not about storage really. storage has always been cheap but the type of storage is probably not. being able to access that info quickly is important. its a bit more complex than having a hard drive sitting somewhere holding info.

anyhow, characters are not deleted unless you delete it yourself. If you just cancelled your pol account they should still have your character. i've had a friend that was gone for maybe 2+ years and he was able to come back. he just didnt delete his char on the char creation screen.

[Vinnie66]

Re: Confused why characters are deleted.

sat on the online chat screen for nearly 6 hrs and never got answered... gg Enix.. I watched 2 movies and had a helluva good time on Minesweeper

[Kailea]

Re: Confused why characters are deleted.

sat on the online chat screen for nearly 6 hrs and never got answered... gg Enix.. I watched 2 movies and had a helluva good time on Minesweeper

stop using the online chat -.- you seem to behaving bad luck with it

Call them

[Armando]

Re: Confused why characters are deleted.

Again, are you sure that your character isn't there? Did you reactivate your Content ID, go to the character selection screen and find it empty? Like Omni said, characters aren't deleted unless you delete them yourself.

[Vinnie66]

Re: Confused why characters are deleted.

yeah im 100% sure it's not. I even bought a new content ID just for the heck of it to see if my character would be on it. It was so new it was a free trial ! I tried the reacvite option.. and I even viewed the option of Active and Inactive services and ID's nothing there. Probably just going to give up..

I can't call them as the 1-852 number I don't think is toll free.. would cost me a fortune to sit on hold for 1-3 hrs or however long they may take

[Kailea]

Re: Confused why characters are deleted.

yeah im 100% sure it's not. I even bought a new content ID just for the heck of it to see if my character would be on it. It was so new it was a free trial ! I tried the reacvite option.. and I even viewed the option of Active and Inactive services and ID's nothing there. Probably just going to give up..

I can't call them as the 1-852 number I don't think is toll free.. would cost me a fortune to sit on hold for 1-3 hrs or however long they may take

wait wait..... you activated a CID, and it was a 30day free trial...

ok you ahve done somethign wrong here, it should not given you a free trial even if your charaters are gone.

When you wanted to start playign agian and installed everything, did you use the new CD keys that came with the new set of CD/DVDs? and or created a new account?

BEcause that sure sounds like what you did.

[Feba]

Re: Confused why characters are deleted.

He used the new keys; if he had used his old account he should've been able to at least attempt to reopen the content ID (at the very least, I've never heard of it being invisible, even if the character isn't on it), and he would not have gotten a free trial.

OP, use your old info.

[Vinnie66]

Re: Confused why characters are deleted.

Here is my story to put it simple. 4-5 years ago I buy FFXI when it was first released in the US. I play for nearly 2 years. I quit game and buy WoW. Cancelling *not deleting* my content ID. Eventualy I grow bored of WoW and using the return to Vandiel campaign I have my content ID restored, I'm back. (and a new set of keys given to me voiding my old ones) The expansion for WoW comes out. Once again I cancel *not delete* my content ID. Eventualy as always WoW becomes boring and I'm looking to see the expansion's here with my original character. That is my story.. so far.

I have been on the chat with a guy, who seemed to nto even bother trying to check and gave me a 2 line reply. (as mentioned above, after a 6 hour wait). I sat on hold on the phone for nearly 3 hours with no answer, and that was after an hour of chain calling to get passed the busy signals, as it was suggested I try call them instead (see above). Being as I work 2nd shift on the east coast (EST) getting a hold of these people is really difficult not to mention it seems like 3478912347912 people are calling or trying to get online support with maybe 1 or 2 agents doing this job. Pretty much ready to give up.

I got off work early today due to lack of work. 6pm EST I got home, and have been on hold on the chat once again since 6:30pm... it's now 8:55pm and they close at 9pm my time (6pm PST).. once again gg SE. I don't see this happening at all...

Even when I was dealing with Sony and EQ i never had 3 hour phone waits or 6 hour online chat waits.. stupid really... and I always thought Sony was the worst.. Square Enix proved me wrong.